1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of automated solid pharmaceutical packaging systems. More specifically, the present invention is directed to automated systems and methods for arranging solid pharmaceutical products in a linear transmission system for the selective transmission of individual solid pharmaceuticals, medications or vitamins.
2. Description of the Related Art
Currently, there are wide variety of known solid pharmaceutical product packaging systems and methods. These conventional packaging and dispensing systems and methods rely upon a variety of different techniques for selectively transmitting one or more solid pharmaceutical products into a package. For example, some of these known systems and methods utilize individual automated dispensing canisters provided in an array such that the array of canisters is arranged to selectively transmit a variety of different pharmaceutical products into a package via a common funnel. Typically, these known conventional systems rely upon a vertically stacked arrangement of the automated dispensing canisters so that a gravity feed path may be provided from the canisters to the common funnel.
One such known system is described in United States patent publication number 2001-xxxxxx. This conventional system provides a funnel that receives the individual solid pharmaceutical products which are selectively transmitted from the individual canisters of the array. The funnel is then selectively located over either a blister package cavity or a temporary storage mechanism that subsequently drops the solid pharmaceutical product into the desired package cavity of a typical blister package. The blister package cavities are subsequently sealed and provided to individual patients.
Another conventional system for selectively packaging pharmaceutical products relies upon the use of a robotic arm for selectively locating a desired automated solid pharmaceutical product dispensing canister at a location corresponding to a solid pharmaceutical product blister package cavity. The robotic arm is programmed to selectively access the automated dispensing canisters which are provided in an array surrounding the robotic arm for convenient access. When the robotic arm positions one of more dispensing canisters above locations corresponding to blister package cavities, the automated dispensing canisters are triggered to release the solid pharmaceutical product into a blister package cavity or package template. Although the known conventional systems have provided a reliable mechanism for automatically packaging solid pharmaceutical products, there are several remaining shortcomings associated with these existing systems.
First, in regard to the systems and methods which utilize a common funnel for initially receiving a plurality of solid pharmaceutical products, there is a noticeable delay associated with the time that it takes for an individual solid pharmaceutical product to transit into its desired location for a blister package cavity from the canister via the funnel. Furthermore, these known systems require additional time for aligning the funnel with respect to its desired location relative to the destination blister package cavity. Although the known systems are significantly faster and more accurate than other conventional techniques, there is always a demand for increases in throughput which typically correlate with a reduction in cost for the packaging operation.
As mentioned above, another packaging technique is the use of a robotic arm to selectively locate one or more automated dispensing canisters at a location corresponding to the desired solid pharmaceutical blister package cavity for placement of the solid pharmaceutical product. Although this approach also improves productivity, this known technique requires that the automated robotic arm physically move each canister from a temporary storage location to the location of each blister package cavity into which the solid pharmaceutical product is to be dispensed. The cumulative transit time that is required for selectively grabbing and moving each automated dispensing canister to the desired location for packaging the solid pharmaceutical products is also significant.
In the United States and throughout the world, as the aging population increases, there is a corresponding if not greater increase in the demand for patient medications. Consequently, there is an ever increasing demand for pharmaceutical packaging products which are both extremely accurate and fast. Although the existing conventional systems quickly and accurately fill solid pharmaceutical product packages, there remains a need for improved throughput and greater efficiencies in the pharmaceutical packaging systems.
Accordingly, one object of the present invention is to provide systems and methods for automatically filling blister packages with solid pharmaceutical products both quickly and accurately. Another object of the present invention is to provide a direct transmission path from a temporary storage location for a plurality of specific solid pharmaceutical products into a desired blister package cavity. Another object and advantage of the present invention is to provide systems and methods which can provide greater throughput over existing conventional automated solid pharmaceutical packaging systems and methods. Other objects and advantages of the present invention will be apparent in light of the following summary and detailed description of the presently preferred embodiments.